An Orlando medical marijuana entrepreneur arranged access to U.S. Rep. Matt Gaetz for the top executive at a cannabis-industry company looking to do business in Florida, while at the same time pressing the company’s leader to donate $10,000 to Gaetz’s reelection campaign, according to records reviewed by the Orlando Sentinel.
The entrepreneur, Orlando hand doctor Jason Pirozzolo, in September 2017 invited the CEO of the company, Alternate Health Corp., to a small fundraiser that Pirozzolo was planning to host for Gaetz at an Orlando hotel during a conference organized by Pirozzolo’s American Medical Marijuana Physicians Association.
The Canadian company had developed medical marijuana monitoring software and was lobbying state officials to make Florida doctors and dispensaries use it. Gaetz, the Panhandle Republican who is Pirozzolo’s friend and one of Florida’s leading medical marijuana policymakers, had agreed to be one of the conference’s keynote speakers.
After making the fundraising invite, the records show Pirozzolo emphasized Gaetz’s importance in the medical marijuana industry, pressed several times for Alternate Health CEO Dr. Michael Murphy to commit to $10,000 for Gaetz’s campaign and sent instructions for how to structure the donations to comply with federal campaign-finance law.
While still waiting for the company to commit to the donations, the records show that Pirozzolo messaged someone who worked with Alternate Health asking for Murphy’s cell phone number.
“Congressman Gaetz would like to call him and see how he can help him,” Pirozzolo wrote. He followed up a short time later, writing, “Gaetz committed to a 1 on 1 meeting for an hour with Murphy.”
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